“Problem?” The laughter vanished from her voice.
“A couple of missed calls from Dad.” He’d wanted time alone with Sadie and he’d purposely left the phone switched off. He shouldn’t have. He shouldn’t have ignored the voice inside him that whispered that happy ever afters weren’t for him. But they were for Sadie! he thought fiercely. And she loves me. He would make this situation right.
“I can drive if you want to call him,” she offered.
“Thanks, but I’ll put him on speaker.” Marcus reversed out of the parking bay and waited till they were out of the airport and on their way to Taos.
Paul answered after a couple of rings. “Hello?”
“Hi, Dad.”
“Marcus.” Paul’s voice flattened. He cleared his throat. “I wanted to warn…to tell you…” He cleared his throat again. “If you were concerned about coming home…back to Boston.” Whatever he had to say, Paul was evidently reluctant to say it.
Sadie leaned toward the phone, worried.
Marcus hated the tension in her body. This was meant to be their time. They’d meet Karma and learn whatever it was she’d not had time to share at their last meeting. Saying a proper good-bye to the phoenix would be the final farewell to his unwanted old life. “Just say it, Dad.”
“Your mom’s gone,” Paul blurted. “Winona left, yesterday. We…argued.”
Dread gathered in Marcus’s muscles. “What did you argue about?”
Paul’s sigh shuddered from the phone. “She blamed you for our kidnapping. I told Winona she was being ridiculous. You didn’t kidnap us. You rescued us.”
“She still believes the psychic’s old prophecy, that the Senator would force me to kill her.” Marcus felt his old control, the hard-won armor he’d worn for nine years, settle over him.
Paul swore. “My father is dead! And you would never kill an innocent. Damn it, Marcus. I’ve been a useless parent, but I know my child. I told Winona that. I told her that she knew it, too. That prophecy was just her excuse. She wanted to run and she did it. She ran. I thought I could understand it. The Senator was…well, you know what he was. But he’s gone, and this time Winona’s running away is on her. ”
“Yes, it is,” Sadie said definitely.
“Uh, hi Sadie?” Paul hadn’t realized the conversation included her.
“Hi, Paul.”
Marcus intervened before the situation grew even more awkward. “Dad, Sadie and I don’t know our plans, but I’ll be in contact.”
“We’ll visit you in Boston,” she said.
Marcus stared at her.
She nodded vigorously.
“Soon,” he added, resigned.
“That would be good.” Paul cleared his throat. “I’ll be glad to see you. Good-bye.”
Marcus switched the phone off. “We’re going to Boston?”
“Your dad needs to see you.” Sadie rubbed her hands along the outer seams of her jeans in a nervous gesture she hadn’t used in days. “The last few days have been intense for us, but your dad buried the man who terrorized him his whole life, was reunited with the woman he loved and whom he thought dead, was kidnapped, worried about you, and now, has lost Winona. Paul needs to see you. You’re his whole family.”
“And he’s mine.”
Sadie laughed.
Surprised, he saw real amusement on her face.
“Marcus, when we were together nine years ago, I was at college in Boston.”
“I remember.”
“Yeah, but I don’t think you get it. I was away from home. You never met my family. But you can’t escape them this time. You’re mine forever and that makes you part of the Howard clan. You now have more uncles, aunts and cousins than anyone could want. Think of little Judy claiming helicopter rides and multiply that by a hundred. Okay, that might be a slight exaggeration. But you have a family. It’s not magical and it’s not wealthy, but we’re loyal and we’re yours.”
He slowed the SUV and stared at her.
She looked at him with love and sympathy shining through her humor. “Your mom has her own problems, whatever they are. But you and I, we’re going to be normal, happy and busy. I’d like your dad to be part of that.”
“I would, too.” He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it, before resting it on his knee.
“And then there’s my Old School network. Life partners get sucked into that, too—when we can trust them, and I trust you so much.” Her fingers tightened around his knee. “You know, if you were wanting to continue an isolated life, I’m not the person you should have fallen in love with.” Now she sounded doubtful.
“You’re my heart, Sadie.” He watched her relax as her fingers stopped squeezing his knee. “Also, I would like to be not so alone. I used to like people. I don’t know if I’ll ever trust easily, but I don’t want to go off and be a recluse. I want to be with you.” Talking about their future helped him push away the darkness that his mother had left, again. She’d decisively rejected him.
But Paul had chosen him. For once, his dad had stood up to a bully and sided with his son. Perhaps something good could grow from that.
“Let’s go straight to the nexus,” Sadie suggested. “I’d like to hear what Karma wants to tell you and say good-bye to her, and then, be alone with you.”
He nodded, aware that she was rearranging their plans to give him emotional support. But she was right. Lunch and love-making could wait. And if they were talking of their future, he had a question he thought would distract her from focusing on Winona’s second betrayal. “How would you like to be a senator’s wife?”
She made a weird sound that was a combination of a cough, a choke and a laugh.
“Dad made the offer earlier, remember? Grandfather’s senate seat is vacant. The governor has to appoint someone to fill it until a special election is called. People vote on name recognition. Senator Aurelius…”
“Senator Marcus Aurelius.” Sadie tugged at her seatbelt, shifting to curl a leg under her and leaning toward him. “Are you seriously thinking of going into politics?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Suddenly I have a life…I’d like to do something with it. Med school…I couldn’t go back to studying. I don’t even know if I could be a doctor.”
“But you’d make a resolute politician.” She gripped his arm. “Marcus, you could do so much good.”
“We could.” He caught her excited expression and slowed the car. The road was empty. “Would you mind the political life? There’d be socializing and media interest.”
“You’re saying I’d have to give up picking?” she asked in a small voice.
“Well…”
She released his arm, but only to lightly slap it. “Marcus, I’m teasing. Picking is something I do. It’s not who I am.”
“I don’t have to be a senator.”
“The decision is yours.” She stretched across and kissed his cheek. “But I’m onboard with it.”
“We’ll talk about it some more.” But he liked her happy and excited, rather than mad at Winona and worried for him. He hadn’t consciously considered Paul’s offer of the senate seat, but obviously his subconscious had been busy if it was ready to put forward the idea to Sadie. An idea she liked. He smiled. Nine years ago she’d been eager to save the world, either as a diplomat or author or some kind of non-government agency employee after college. Their life together had been interrupted, but old dreams could come true. He and Sadie could take on Washington as a team.
He drove through Taos and on through the mountains. A pair of ravens scattered from the road in front of the car, flying into the underbrush where wildflowers bloomed amid green spring grass.
The power of the nexus, minor though it was, pulled on his senses, dislodging thoughts of the future for the immediate moment.
It seemed Sadie felt the nexus as well or else she recognized the side road. “Marcus, whatever Karma says to you…to us. You’re mine. Don’t think of leaving me or retreating deep inside yourself
to handle things alone.”
He stopped the car near the ponderosa pine where they’d parked last time and looked at her.
Her expression was earnest and determined.
“I love you, Sadie. I’ll fight the world to be with you and I’ll fight myself, my instincts. I won’t shut you out.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
They got out of the car and walked to the rocky ground at the center of the nexus. He held Sadie’s hand and halted at the edge of the clearing.
Marcus. My child. The voice rose from the earth and resonated in the cool mountain air. There were clouds massing on the horizon. A mountain storm was brewing. Karma’s spirit body blinked into view, glowing in the heart of the nexus.
“Hello, Karma,” Marcus said steadily. He didn’t understand why she would call him her child. She had been his to care for, a fledgling. It seemed incredible, though, that the small bird that had perched on his shoulder and eaten from his hand should be this awe-inspiring magical creature. How had his grandfather caged her mother?
You have found your mate. Greetings, Sadie.
“Hello, Karma. Or should we call you by another name?”
Names have power, child. Karma is yours for me, and the one by which I’ll hear your voices. I have another name which I hadn’t heard in decades, but I am home, now.
Marcus froze. Karma wasn’t decades old. “I saw your egg beside your mother. She was in eagle form in the Senator’s cage.”
A phoenix is not reborn in fire. We have the magic, though, to form new bodies. When the trapper caught and sold me to the Senator, the shackles and his bleeding of me—no! Child, I do not blame you. You eased my heart. The great beak of Karma’s spirit form touched Marcus’s head gently, like a warm desert wind.
Creating an egg to be the new vessel for my spirit required a lot of magic. I could only slowly accumulate it, and then, the Senator began feeding you my blood. He addicted you to raw phoenix blood, but he never understood that he created a bond between you and I. What he initially stole, I then gave freely. I fed you as my child. You were mine to love. So I waited. I waited till you were strong enough to survive and to break the addiction. Then I transferred my spirit from the eagle body to the nestling in its shell. In doing so, I fled the enchanted shackles that had imprisoned me.
“You stayed caged for me?” Marcus asked hoarsely.
As you were willing to die rather than bleed me, Karma responded.
“Oh my God.” Sadie was crying. The words were a prayer. “You looked out for him,” she said to Karma.
There was little I could do while I was caged, but the magic in my blood, that I could shape to strengthen Marcus to survive it.
“I transformed into a griffin,” he said, although Karma had been there. She’d seen it happen. But he was afraid of the griffin’s instincts and how the werewolf’s form had shaped Nelson.
That was the magic settling into you. The choice to transform or not is yours, now. Always. Karma paused. Her spirit body turned to look at the mountains and the nearing storm. Lightning flashed. Marcus, your magic is no longer human. You are, but your magic is that of my kind. The magic of the air will answer your call. You can use it as you have always used magic. But you can also do more. Child, I will find you wherever you are and visit. Go now. Be with your mate. Mine is calling me. One day soon, he will meet you. She flew into the heart of the storm and vanished.
“Marcus.” Sadie hugged him as the clouds above them burst and cold rain saturated them. “There is your mother. Karma gave her freedom for you.”
He ignored the pelting rain, holding Sadie close and staring at her, not the storm or where Karma had vanished. “I thought I was saving her. Dying so that Karma could live free, not be bled to feed my addiction. And all the time…all the time, she’d saved me.”
“Loved you,” Sadie said softly. She kissed his mouth just as tenderly.
Passion flared in him. If not for the storm, he’d have made love to her there on the mountain, at the nexus. Instead, he ran with her back to the car and drove down to the cabin. Inside, he ignited with a thought the logs set ready in the fireplace. As they burned, he helped Sadie strip off her wet clothes in front of the fire and rubbed her dry with a towel. “Do you need a hot shower?”
She gave him a cute look of utter disbelief. “I need you.” She took the towel from him.
He tore out of his clothes and threw the towel away. “I don’t care if I’m wet.” All he cared about was taking her mouth and caressing her body and hearing her murmurs of pleasure.
Sadie pushed Marcus onto his back. He was making love to her in a frenzy of passion, only caring about bringing her pleasure. That was good. That was great! But she wanted to touch him, too. To hear him respond to her. The fire heated her skin, but not as much as the desire burning inside her.
She nipped at the strong cords of his throat and slid lower to flick her tongue over a flat male nipple, still lower to kiss the rippling muscles of his stomach.
He tangled his hand in her hair and urged her back up. “I don’t have that much control.”
“I don’t want you controlled,” she panted.
He groaned and reached for a condom, rolling it on. “Remember you asked for this.”
“Oh yeah.” It was a sexy fantasy, to make love to the man she adored in front of an open fire. She barely waited for the condom before she pounced on him. He slid into her with the utter perfection of physical bodies expressing their soul connection. They paused with twin sighs that were almost groans.
Then Marcus started to move.
Firelight danced over his skin. The mountain storm had darkened the day to a twilight atmosphere. Occasional lightning flashes sparked extra electricity into the air and over her sensitive nerves. When thunder crashed, she climaxed.
Marcus kept going, relentlessly, and her climax rolled on with the storm. He flipped them so that he could drive into her. The fake fur rug was soft against her skin. His skin was hot, the rain drying on it. He was gorgeous and compelling with passion tautening his expression into one of erotic demand.
She watched his face, held him close, and lived the moment when he climaxed.
He shouted her name.
She’d asked her talent to find her safety, but it had found her heart. She caressed his back possessively. Happiness burned in her fiercer than any fire.
“What are you thinking about so seriously?” His fast breathing eased. He pushed up to study her face.
She smiled. “Lunch,” she blurted, then shrieked with laughter as he tickled her and blew a raspberry against her tummy.
Romance came and went, but their love would be forever.
The Old School Series
Follow the amulet to Catalina Island for further adventures. You can preorder Fantastical Island now for 99c. It releases February 21, 2017.
Discover the Collegium series, today. Paranormal romance and adventure with shifters, demons, dragons and more! Each stand-alone novel is free to read in Kindle Unlimited.
Demon Hunter
Djinn Justice
Dragon Knight
Doctor Wolf
Plague Cult
Hollywood Demon
Alchemy Shift
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Phoenix Blood (Old School Book 1) Page 20
